Beyond the Dutroux Affair The reality of protected child abuse ... - Soup

asement, had hidden letters under Dutroux's carpet. Michaux
failed to find them, for which he would be criticized by Michel
Bourlet in 2004 (18).
• Even though more than 10 years have passed since Dutroux was
arrested on suspicions of having kidnapped Laetitia, largely because
of Michaux it is still somewhat of a mystery how many videos were
confiscated in late 1995 and in August 1996 (19). Initial reports after
Dutroux's arrest stated that the justice department was in the
possession of more than 300 videos (20); within several weeks this
number was upped to 5,000 videos. Reports that Dutroux's
accomplices, including a number of high level officials, could be seen
on these tapes also began to appear (21). In the end, this seems to
have been a huge exaggeration (22), even though the exact amount
of videos remains a bit of a mystery (23). Most estimates today are
below 100, and only a portion of these videos appear to have shown
Dutroux abusing young girls.
Nihoul
One of the most important reasons for speculation about a network has
been Michel Nihoul. This person had been arrested on August 16 after the
investigators of Bourlet and Connerotte found out that on August 10, one
day after Lelievre and Dutroux had kidnapped Laetitia, Nihoul had
supplied Lelievre, free of charge, with 1,000 XTC pills. The original
investigators immediately suspected that these pills served as a payment
for the kidnapping of Laetitia, suspicions which were only fueled when
Nihoul was unable to provide an alibi for August 8 (24), the day when at
least 8 witnesses claim to have seen Nihoul in Bertrix at and around the
location where Laetitia would be kidnapped the next day. Additionally,
some of these witnesses claimed to have seen Nihoul in the presence of
Dutroux (or his van), who was carrying out an initial surveillance that day
(25). Both Dutroux's wife Michele Martin and Michel Lelievre specified
that Dutroux, at least in some cases, kidnapped girls according to specific
wishes of clients. Martin stated that one of these clients was Michel
Nihoul.
Michele Martin, Dutroux's wife: "I have heard Marc personally telling
Lelievre that he should bring a girl for Michel Nihoul. If I haven't
mentioned that before, that is because I'm afraid of that gang, I mean